Distance

Two years ago I was in Scotland for a funeral. It was two days before Christmas. I arrived the night before and made my way through the thick snowfall from the station to the guest house I’d booked, finding the door unlocked and a key and note on the hallway table, directing me to my room and telling me the time for breakfast. I went out again that night, to explore the small town and head to the only pub still open, but that is another story.

In the morning I woke up early, hearing nothing, and went down to breakfast, where I met the owner. The house was still. He was standing in the front room, looking out at the street. A concise exchange: The only guest in the house. Busy in the summer. Quiet in the Winter. From London? Funeral? A sad business. The milk for the tea is in the small fridge by the yoghurts. Door’s never locked. Make yourself at home.

I sat at one of the tables and we shared a complete silence save for my munching of toast. He never left his post by the window. In the silence, and the grim anticipation of the day ahead only a delay away, I felt quite calm. The snow, the hills, the slate roofs, the isolation. When I returned that evening the door was unlocked again, I collected my bags and left as alone as I arrived.

I’m thinking of that moment and that place as I sit now writing in Powiśle, knowing that prussaki and other creepy-crawlies are lurking in the kitchen, smelling the sewage which occasionally swamps the bathroom and turns the flat into one big cloaca. The trains rattle past, now whistling sometimes not. The roar from the autostrada. The clink and clank of trams passing by. I’m in the city alright, as far away from that moment and place as possible, and I’m not sure I like it.